love* in the time of plague (and by love* i mean brexit* and other dreary matters of uk politics)

;)

The next United Kingdom general election is scheduled to be held on Thursday 2 May 2024.

three short years and eleven shorter months away!

how does the festering corpse of the tory party pick itself up here. some sort of war?

At some point in the coming couple of weeks they're going to clock that the honest-to-god last chance for a Brexit extension expires at the end of June. That has the potential to get spicy, even if they all promised to be rabid Brexiteers in the Before.

Eh, they got rid of everyone who believes anything other than "Johnny Foreigner doesn't like it up 'em" last year.

Tears for Dominic Grieve rn

I know, and they all signed their little pledge too. But I wonder how much that will count for when push comes to shove with Dom's Hard Brexit. (I mean, if the govt wants it then it will happen, but I reckon there'll be a row, it won't be all flags and bulldogs)

Starmer won't beat Johnson because Boris is highly unlikely to contest the next election. Why would he when he could fuck off to the most lucrative after dinner speech market of all time? (Assuming he doesn't become Neville Chamberlain in the meantime that is).

Eden liked taking a Caribbean vacation while his reputation and standing went down the pisser as well, although in completely different circumstances.

Tory lead down to 4 points. The fact that they have a lead at all is shocking.

Have the Lib Dems just given up?

I just read John Smith had a 20 point lead post black wednesday and all the other shit, the last time the Tories were probably even more competent than they are now!

xp

the LibDems still haven't got a new leader, they are probably doing much soul searching about flanking fucking lame-melt Starmer Labour from a few microns to the the left.

was sure Ed Davey was their leader, or is that interim

Have the Lib Dems just given up?

no the leadership LibDem race is still a going concern, even more riveting than a amateur riders' selling hurdle at Towcester

Pretty sure Ed Davey has been LibDem leader for longer than Jo Swinson who actually beat him in the contest.

that light that burns twice as shite...

just let their MPs take turns imo, a month each

UBI this month... and erm.. oh dear kill the disabled + the poor month again next i'm afraid .. it'll all balance out in the end though!

realistic simulation of LD policy imo

was gonna do a riff on Chuka running and then i remembered why that won't be happening

Im kinda hoping Layla Moran becomes leader and takes some points off the Cons in the south, She seems the best of a bad bunch as well, though no doubt I'll be swiftly disabused of that notion by someone

as ever, comes down to voting record

https://www.theyworkforyou.com/mp/25689/layla_moran/oxford_west_and_abingdon/votes

def not a monster and well to the left of swinson, but alas still a lib dem mp. if she becomes leader, should amalgamate the party with keir starmer's labour (from which her viewpoints appear fairly indistinguishable) to become the supermelt double-cheese pizza of a political party ('neoliberalism's last hurrah!') we all dream of

Rosie Duffield giving the whatabouters a hernia, I see

I have a to say I'd been wondering which Labour MP was going to get this treatment today.

Rank amateurism in allowing her to resign as opposed to letting Starmer publically sack her.

Really good summary of where we are at.

The UK government has 'launched' a test and trace system this week, which is being used as the justification to re-open non-essential shops and send reception, year 1 and year 6 children back to school. It's also relaxed some curfew restrictions at the same time.

— libcom.org (@libcomorg) May 31, 2020

I know some people in this thread have had covid but reading it you just think we've barely begun with this disease and it's response.

it does look to the untrained eye as if the UK gov has spent the last 3 months doing fuck all about Covid

and most of the public statements of scientific advisers has been some real "Profiles in Courage" stuff

I feel lucky to have had it, and scared shitless on behalf of everyone who hasn't. This is such a flaming bag of shit. I only hope enough people survive it to demand an inquiry that puts heads on spikes.

That intervention from the scientists is brutal.

One of the letter’s main authors, Prof David McCoy, director of the centre for public health at Queen Mary University, London, described the test, trace and isolate system – which aims to quarantine people with Covid-19 and those who have been in contact with them – as “a mess”.

“It is not a system,” he told the Observer. “It is just a fragmented collection of different programmes with nothing really holding them together. We needed to have spent much of April organising the test and trace programme and that was not done. We have wasted the time we had bought ourselves.”

Part of that failure could be blamed on Dominic Cummings, he added. “Firstly he breached the lockdown rules but also as the chief adviser to the prime minister he has to take some responsibility for the failure of the government to make a proper response to Covid.”

Try to avoid using the word spike if possible.

(xp)

There is no way that they're going to get away with blaming a second outbreak on the public, the anger is immediately going to be directed at Johnson, Cummings and Hancock.

I hope you're right, nothing would surprise me

It does seem designed to shift the blame to the public.

it does look to the untrained eye as if the UK gov has spent the last 3 months doing fuck all about Covid

I continue to be slightly astounded at the pitiful incompetence of the UK response, don't know why I'm surprised really but it's the absolute refusal to learn from mistakes or realise how badly they're shooting themselves in the foot at every single moment.

that a significant chunk of the british public continue to defend them is just as, if not more, depressing imo

UK response? Bit unfair on Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

lol Wales

Well, their schools aren't re-opening tomorrow.

But, yes, LOL even the Welsh are refusing to do as Westminster says.

lots of folk frothing on twitter about how there is no planning permission so no council tax charge at the spare house on daddykins estate that Cummings was staying in, seems like small beer in the current scheme of things but maybe another nail in the cunt's coffin

England, I meant! Looking forward to visiting the Gaelic Alliance countries in a few years btw, if they'll let me in.

This is pretty good on how the government may get away with it, as the virus isn't understood.

My reading on the govts loosening of the lockdown. There is some loose evidence out there that the maximum natural course of the virus has already been reached in the U.K, or at least in badly impacted areas.

— W Bott (@willbott4) May 31, 2020

If that turns out to be the case then it's extremely good news for everyone, but it isn't really anything other than speculation really.

yeah it seems to rest on a lot assumptions i’m not seeing a lot of elsewhere